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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22501609">in this life we lead, we could conquer anything (if we could just get the brains to get out of bed in the morning)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/AwesomeBooknerd/pseuds/AwesomeBooknerd'>AwesomeBooknerd</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>there is very little left of me and it’s never coming back [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Stranger Things (TV 2016)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Steve Harrington Needs a Hug, Steve Harrington-centric, gonna post some more st soonish i think??, got a few longer plot-y things in the works, i think thats it!!, im j vibing in the tags ig, insert that one blushing emoji here but im not on mobile and idk how computers work, most relationships other than steve and joyce are very minor!, nothing diagnosed or anything tbh bc thats my sitch yeehaw, pls check warnings b4 reading!! want yall to be safe, this is just a vent projected onto Steve bc i'm now hyperfixating on st, uh the stoncy is like. v implied and just like one line but im in love w that ship so-, ventfic</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 17:54:54</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,105</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22501609</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/AwesomeBooknerd/pseuds/AwesomeBooknerd</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Steve thinks maybe he's always been this way, this empty and fake. And maybe it's for the best! But something about feeling this disconnected from everything scares him.</p><p>or: in which I project my issues onto Steve and then reemphasize his good support system because this is purely self-indulgent ventfic!!</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Jonathan Byers/Steve Harrington/Nancy Wheeler, Joyce Byers &amp; Steve Harrington, Robin Buckley &amp; Steve Harrington, Steve Harrington &amp; The Party</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>there is very little left of me and it’s never coming back [2]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1683265</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>23</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>158</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>in this life we lead, we could conquer anything (if we could just get the brains to get out of bed in the morning)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>*strolls back into my ao3 account 2 years after posting my last fic with a big ventfic in a non-anime fandom and a completely new/hopefully better writing style ft an unreasonable amt of italics, parentheses, and run-on sentences*: hey guys</p><p>title is from Brave as a Noun by AJJ!!</p><p>WARNINGS! please read before the story just in case!<br/>this is gonna be a lot of vaguely described mental health stuff bc I dont personally have all the words for this, its just personal experience but this story describes:<br/>- intrusive thoughts<br/>- derealism or depersonalization?? I think?? or something like that- a disconnection from your sense of self essentially<br/>- the intrusive thoughts veer toward suicidal at one or two points- if you want to know when to read around it, pls leave a comment or something! I,, tend to assume ppl just won't read as a whole if that part triggers them in a ventfic like this but I could be wrong!!<br/>Just generally be careful, safe, and healthy! I'm working on getting better, and I hope y'all are too!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Some days, Steve doesn’t feel… maybe real is the word he’s looking for? He feels like an actor in some trivial story, just a random game piece being moved around from place to place, going only where he’s told.</p><p>And most of the time? Honestly he doesn’t mind it. It’s easier than worrying about whatever’s going. If he doesn’t feel any connection to his life, he can’t be upset by how it’s going! It’s… fine.</p><p>But it’s also kind of scary. Steve’s not really sure what real people are supposed to feel like but he’s pretty sure-</p><p>
  <i>He’s clutching his face, running his fingernails down his cheeks harshly, tears staining his pillow. Why can’t he fucking feel it? Who is he? Where is he? What’s going on? <b>Why the fuck can’t he feel his own (Is it really his? How can he say ‘his’  if he doesn’t know who he is?) goddamn face?</b></i>
</p><p>-Steve is pretty sure they don’t feel like this.</p><p>But what is he supposed to do about that? Tell someone? What would he even say? ‘Hey, how was your day, mine would probably be great if I could feel that or remember more of it!’ Yeah, that would go over well with his already (justifiably) paranoid friends. And besides, who would he even tell?</p><p>Not one of the kids, they shouldn’t have to handle his bullshit, they’re children. Not Joyce or Hop (though that’s… almost tempting. To have a real grownup who genuinely cares trying to help him…), they were already looking after practically all of the kids. Six whole kids, not counting Jonathan or Nancy or Robin! They shouldn’t have to deal with him, a technical adult, on top of all that. And Nancy and Jonathan and Robin would… he doesn’t know. That feels rude or something, dumping his problems on them when he knows they have enough of their own, and Steve can already tell they’d all give him their version of puppy-dog eyes, all sad, and he can’t stand it when they look like that, he loves them too much.</p><p>So that leaves him back at square one because, wow, that’s all of his friends now!</p><p>Sometimes Steve worries that his… issue is somehow Upside Down-related. That something made it through the Gate before it closed and now it’s wreaking it’s revenge upon him personally because he can’t seem to get a break in life. But nothing else is going wrong, and El would say something if she noticed something off in that way- and he’s sure she or Will would notice.</p><p>But that leaves the almost worse conundrum, that this all on him, that he’s some kind of screw up who can’t even live quite right because he’s too busy freaking out (<i>tugging at his face and it still doesn’t feel right, still doesn’t feel, and he’s losing it again, wondering if he’s ever done anything that matters and he thinks would it change anything if he died right now and he thinks would that make this story more interesting and he thinks</i>) over some dumb part of his brain telling him he’s not a person, as though that even matters (<i>maybe he’s always been like this, he barely remembers middle school and maybe this is why, maybe he’s always been this hollow and empty and fake</i>).</p><p>As though anything matters, because Steve’s been having a hard time seeing a purpose in anything lately (<i>a purpose in <b>living</b> lately</i>). It all seems… fake, just like everything else. Maybe-</p><p>But there are the kids and there are his friends, who he loves more than anything, and even if everything feels muted and gray and awful, he still has them and he still wants them to be happy, no matter what it takes. He’s… supposed to be taking the kids to a group get-together at the diner today, isn’t he? Huh. He’s lost track of time (<i>again</i>), he hopes it’s still alright.</p><p>Steve is almost 30 minutes late picking up the kids from their respective houses. He comes up with an acceptable lie for them (<i>I was doing… grownup shit, y’know, taxes and stuff. What? I totally do that kind of stuff, I’m an adult. Fine, fine! Breakfast Club was on, you know I can’t resist that movie, sue me!</i>) to cover for the fact that he was laying in bed, staring at the ceiling, lost in that blank gray space in his head for hours.</p><p>He drives them to the diner on autopilot, filling in ‘hm’s and ‘that’s nice’s and ‘quiet down, little shits’s and pasted-on smiles whenever he knows it’s appropriate. He can’t tell if they notice something’s off, if they can see how disconnected he is today in particular, but he hopes they can’t. They shouldn’t have to deal with his bullshit right now, it’s supposed to be a nice day out and he won’t let his stupid fucking brain ruin that for them. They reach the diner somewhat peacefully.</p><p>Steve can tell the moment he walks in that this is going to be a rough evening. The kids are already squeezed into their favorite corner, leaving him a seat next to Joyce Byers and across from Nancy, and he knows they, of all people, are most likely to notice something off, too intelligent and observant to let discrepancies slide. Mere moments after he sits down, Joyce speaks up.</p><p>“Steve, are you okay, honey? You look a little pale,” She’s looking at him with such genuine concern on his face, and <i>oh my god</i> he can feel himself tear up, <i>what the fuck, brain?</i></p><p>He blinks back the tears because he definitely shouldn’t be crying over pleasantries in the middle of the diner, and pastes on a smile full of forced brightness, a tool he’s found extremely handy over the years, “Yeah, no worries, Ms. Byers, might be coming down with something, you know how it is this time of year!”</p><p>Nancy pipes up from across the table now, because the universe just won’t give him a break, and she has this little furrow in her brow that he <i>knows</i> means she’s found something weird and won’t be dropping it until she understands, “You never get sick though. I literally had the flu for a solid week and you came over <i>every day</i> and still didn’t get it. Are you sure? Nothing really… <i>weird</i> going on?” And of course she’s worried about it being unnatural, that makes sense, they wouldn’t want anything coming back to hurt the kids (<i>why would she be concerned about you? what is there to be concerned about if you aren’t really there?</i>).</p><p>And Steve is tearing up again. Goddamnit. He’s always been shit at even vaguely serious conversations, he needs to deflect this somehow, make them stop asking these questions that make his guts feel like they want to come out through his mouth and his heart simultaneously feel like stopping dead and beating out of his chest.</p><p>“No, it’s alright, really!” He hears himself say, muffled a little because he feels even less There than he was before, and maybe his voice is a little too loud because a few of the kids glance over and he shoots them a quick smile to reassure them before turning back to Joyce and Nancy, “Really, might just be a cold or something. I’m just kind of tired, I’ll try to get more sleep tonight.” And they leave it alone, thankfully.</p><p>Kind of. Ms. Byers and Nancy (and somehow Hopper and Jonathan are in on it now because they’re doing it too) keep shooting him concerned looks and comforting smiles throughout the meal and honestly the combined force of Nancy and Jonathan’s puppy-dog eyes would probably take him out on a better day but right now he’s just trying to skate through the dinner. It’s a little hard to react quite as well as he usually does, what with the kind of muted quality everything has right now, and Steve can’t really <i>feel</i> the way he normally does, but other than that it’s alright. He thinks he’s doing pretty well, he’s got it on lock (<i>he’s not thinking about grabbing the steak knife and turning it toward himself and-</i>), dinners wrapping up and he’s about to reach for the check and-</p><p>Suddenly Hopper’s grabbing the check and Joyce is nudging his arm and quietly asking to talk to him outside and Nancy and Jonathan have already sprung up to corral the kids before they leap at him and everything’s moving so fast in his already-muffled state that Steve has no choice but to go with the flow. Joyce leads him out of the restaurant.<br/>
Once they’re comfortably tucked out of the way, she turns to him looking so incredibly worried that he starts to wonder if something’s truly amiss.</p><p>“What’s going on? Is it something with Will or one of the other kids? Should I get my bat or something? It’s right in my trunk but I think I left my lighter and stuff at home, so it’d take longer to get that-“ Joyce cuts him off with a fond smile and a hand on his shoulder.</p><p>“No, Steve, I’m pretty sure nothing Upside Down-related is causing trouble right now, but I appreciate your concern,” He feels a little silly and wants to apologize, but she continues, “What I want to ask about is <i>you</i>. Why don’t you tell me how you’re <i>actually</i> doing? It’s ok to be feeling bad, even if it’s not a physical thing! I’m worried, sweetie, you don’t look okay.”</p><p>Steve is floored. He… doesn’t know how to respond to this. She didn’t have to do this, he was doing fine pretending everything was normal and he could just act like a real person even if he didn’t feel like one. How was he supposed to act in the face of her concern?</p><p>Instead of reacting like a normal person, Steve bursts into tears.</p><p>“Oh, honey,” Ms. Byers is murmuring as she wraps him in a hug and presses him to her shoulder and now he sobbing into it and he’s vaguely worried about her shirt but it’s <i>nice</i>, “Oh, sweetheart, it’s okay, I know, you’re doing so well. You’ve been so strong, but it’s okay, you don’t have to hold it in anymore. It’s okay.”</p><p>They stay there like that for a while, Steve sobbing into Ms. Byers’ shoulder as she whispers reassurance into his ear. Eventually his crying peters out and after a few minutes more, she pulls away to look into his eyes.</p><p>“So, are you ready to tell me what that was about? Or do you need a few more minutes?” She asks.</p><p>“I-“ Steve is cut off by his breath hiccuping a few times, but he knows he should probably tell her. She’s been nothing but kind to him and she doesn’t need this stress but he’s pretty sure she’ll just worry more if he doesn’t answer her, no matter how tempting that is. “I just. I feel bad? I don’t feel… like a real person I guess? And, like, that sounds dumb or whatever, but I just feel kind of fake. Sometimes? Like I’m just a character in a story or something and I don’t have control over anything. It’s been.. kinda bad lately even though it usually goes away when I’m around friends and stuff and I don’t really know what’s going on but it feels really weird and I just- don’t know what to do.” Steve knows he’s rambling, so he tries to cut himself short before he can spill even more than what he already has.</p><p>But it’s already enough that Joyce is looking at him with a sad, soft look in her eyes, almost… heartbroken? Oh, she didn’t deserve that, he’d messed up, <i>wasn’t playing his part correctly, could he rewind?</i>, Steve could feel himself going hazy again, preparing to fade to the back of his mind and retract everything he said, play it off somehow, but Ms. Byers pulled him into another strong hug before he could retreat.</p><p>“Sweetheart, it’s not dumb to feel bad, or to need help, or to just… want a shoulder to cry on! You can let us know- let me know! I’m so sorry, it sounds like you’ve had to deal with this for so long, honey. It’s going to be okay, we’re going to help you. It’s going to be okay.”</p><p>And as Steve listened to Ms. Byers’ reassurances, he knew she was right. Maybe not now, maybe not for a long time, maybe not easily, but he was going to be okay.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>I simply want joyce byers to hug me and tell me im doing ok,, *you are my mo-om, youre my mom! boogie woogie woogie!*</p><p>I might continue this/post an alternate (sadder?) ending at some point but mostly I wanted to get it out! Sorry for the vagueness at the end/regarding what specifically is going on with Steve, thats p much just also a reflection of my situation, hope y'all are doing alright in general &amp; gn/gm!</p></blockquote></div></div>
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